RIP Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

[mox 298]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7540821.stm

If you know what a gulag is, you have Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn to thank. Up until that point, human rights abuses in the Soviet Union went largely unreported. We had to read his best-known work, "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" in AP English when I was in high school, and then strangely enough it was required reading once again when I went to Cryptology school in the Navy (as a sort of propaganda I assume). Highly recommended reading, and unlike a lot of Russian literature it's actually a pretty fast and easy read.

[1HappyGuy 45]

Amen to that. He did so much for opening up the darkness that was the soviet system.

[slim 1,530]

AP English?

Mox, you've been overachieving since back in the day? I thought it was just a VJ thing!

[mox 298]

AP English?

Mox, you've been overachieving since back in the day? I thought it was just a VJ thing!

Guilty as charged, although there are some VJ'ers (if you can call someone who creates an account(s) solely to troll, a "VJ'er") who bring it out in me more than others.

[KGSodie 0]

AP English?

Mox, you've been overachieving since back in the day? I thought it was just a VJ thing!

Guilty as charged, although there are some VJ'ers (if you can call someone who creates an account(s) solely to troll, a "VJ'er") who bring it out in me more than others.

Hey, don't talk about me like that, I'm right here.

[Brad and Vika 129]

AP English?

Mox, you've been overachieving since back in the day? I thought it was just a VJ thing!

Guilty as charged, although there are some VJ'ers (if you can call someone who creates an account(s) solely to troll, a "VJ'er") who bring it out in me more than others.

Hey, don't talk about me like that, I'm right here.

Seriously, what ever happened to Korat anyway?

[mox 298]

Hey, don't talk about me like that, I'm right here.

Yeah but you're one of the good trolls.

Seriously, what ever happened to Korat anyway?

Call me an incurable romantic, but I hope he's off spooning with Boris, his Ukrainian girlfriend.

[Brad and Vika 129]

Hey, don't talk about me like that, I'm right here.

Yeah but you're one of the good trolls.

Seriously, what ever happened to Korat anyway?

Call me an incurable romantic, but I hope he's off spooning with Boris, his Ukrainian girlfriend.

[slim 1,530]

I imagine his days are pretty full.

So little time, so many blacklists.

[Danno 1,228]

Yeah it was a little Ironic I heard about him not so long ago and was 80% the way through one of his books when I found out he died.

I read a column by the famed Atheist Hitchens (linked on the DrudgeReport) about Aleksander. He refers to a speech that He (aleksander) made back in the seventies which When I followed the link, I found it interesting to read.

For those that don't know he was exiled (is that the right word) from Russian for some 20 yrs.

He ended up living in the New england area and drew both good and bad impressions of our style of Democracy.

Somewhere along the way, Him and Putin saw eye to eye on the concept that Russia is a unique country with it's own path to follow.

Aleksander was a devout Orthodox follower and felt Russian needed to mix Govt and the faith to

prevent her from following the downward moral spiral the rest of the west is on.

Any way I like people who have a "real-life-story" to tell and come away with a unique perspective, thanks Mox for starting the thread.

[Fedup 0]

Yeah it was a little Ironic I heard about him not so long ago and was 80% the way through one of his books when I found out he died.

I read a column by the famed Atheist Hitchens (linked on the DrudgeReport) about Aleksander. He refers to a speech that He (aleksander) made back in the seventies which When I followed the link, I found it interesting to read.

For those that don't know he was exiled (is that the right word) from Russian for some 20 yrs.

He ended up living in the New england area and drew both good and bad impressions of our style of Democracy.

Somewhere along the way, Him and Putin saw eye to eye on the concept that Russia is a unique country with it's own path to follow.

Aleksander was a devout Orthodox follower and felt Russian needed to mix Govt and the faith to

prevent her from following the downward moral spiral the rest of the west is on.

Any way I like people who have a "real-life-story" to tell and come away with a unique perspective, thanks Mox for starting the thread.

I don't think lately he and Putin saw it "eye to eye" anymore, Russia moving towards imperialism. But yes, Aleksander being a person of faith, and tying Russia's future with faith he was more moralist than a political person.

That made his literature so important, a moral view of the issues. Put a cracks in the system that let the light in, and lead to the end of the system. It might not have worked if he politicized the issues, but from moral prospective, right and wrong made clear, and anyone free to draw own conclusions.

I think people like him are the ones to thank for political changes of 80s-90s, not politicians or military.